That's some ridiculous circular logic. If we let fewer unsafe drivers drive, not driving will be safer. And even people that truly need a car to get to work don't need a car with only one person in it; they can simply get into a vehicle that SOMEONE ELSE IS DRIVING.

They can be just as productive WITH SOMEONE ELSE DRIVING THEM. It will just be less convenient and perhaps embarrassing (not that not driving is inconvenient and embarrassing, but people that drive everywhere often feel it is). Countless people that CAN'T drive manage.

I'm sure there are many reasons people pay for MS Office when Google Docs is free.

Personally, I wanted a real-time cloud backup system, so I chose OneDrive, which costs about the same as other cloud backup systems

But you said "People will always choose the free versions".

Just as you do not care about harms to children

There you go assuming my opinion again. I actually do care about harm to children, which is why I don't like bullshit that makes you feel better but does nothing to stop harm to children.

The internet is more closely aligned to the road, and web sites are the stores. Anyone can walk along the road, but to enter some stores, proof age is required.

Okay, let's go with that.
If you go into a store that requires proof of age, purchase a porn mag, and put it on the road outside the store, or at the playground, or at the community center... a child can look at it. The porn mag is not going to ask for any proof of age before it opens. It is still only the purchasing that is behind an age check. Checking ID at the door simply moves the point of that age check.
Buying a gun is behind an age check in the US too, by the way. Heck possessing is too in most states (minors are only supposed to use them in certain situations and/or with supervision). The age checks clearly aren't doing shit.
Porn is available in civilized countries too. Laws about internet porn are very new - civilized countries had internet porn without age verification laws for decades. And the USA was fucked up long before the internet came along. (And actually, violent crime has been steady going down in the US since the world wide web came along. That's an observed correlation, I'm not suggesting any causation.) So porn ain't the problem and even if it was forcing 4chan to do age checks wouldn't do shit about it.

If stores dont want to obey OUR laws, then lock their doors against us

Sorry, the US has anti-discrimination laws, so a store that locked out foreigners would be breaking OUR laws. You'll just have to not go in.

Web sites that have no "adult" content, eg most stores,

Hold on now. Most stores in the US do have "adult content" (alcohol, cigarettes, lottery tickets, etc. And some things that don't require age verification but that I would consider adult content, but I won't get into that). The only time age verification is needed at the door is when a store has exclusively adult content. So, by the logic of web sites are the stores, 4chan wouldn't even be one that has to ID at the door. They would, again, only have to ID when someone purchases something.
And if you don't plan on going into any place nor buying anything that requires age verification, you can leave your ID at home and you can still walk on the road. Heck you're not even required to get an ID, actually.

They sell porn mags at those weed stores? Or I guess you want to talk about weed now?
If you show your ID and go into a weed store, then purchase some weed, then you then take some weed (or a porn mag) and sit it on your coffee table, it will not ask for age verification before your 12 year old cousin smokes it (or opens the mag).

The adult that purchases the porn mag or weed has to be responsible with it, and not leave it unsecured where an unsupervised 12 year old can get it and look it at or smoke it. Just as the adult that purchases internet access has to be responsible with it and not leave it unsecured where an unsupervised 12 year old can use it inappropriately. And yeah, some people won't be responsible. But we still don't require age verification before weed is smoked or porn mags are viewed.

Although actually, a weed store is not a good analogy for the internet, since there's some things that are appropriate for 12 year olds on the internet, while a weed store only has things that are inappropriate for 12 year olds. A better analogy is the many grocery stores in SanFran that sell alcohol and cigarettes. You have to show ID to purchase alcohol or cigarettes, but not before entering a grocery store that sells them. 12 year olds are allowed in grocery stores, even unsupervised. The bottles of alcohol in the grocery store aren't going to ask for ID if a 12 year old opens one up and starts drinking it. But parents are expected to supervise their children in the grocery store until each child is mature enough that they can be trusted to not drink the alcohol. If a child does drink alcohol in the grocery store, the alcohol (which would be the website in this analogy) isn't blamed, and the alcohol manufacturer (which would be the webmaster this analogy) isn't blamed. Nobody says the grocery store should start requiring IDs before letting anyone in, nobody says bottles of alcohol should start requiring ID before they open. It's that specific child and the parents that are in trouble. The child for drinking the alcohol and the parents for not supervising the child well enough.

But, we've had pretty much this same conversation before, multiple times. I wish Slashdot had a block option.

No, that only sets a precedent for requiring age-verification before allowing purchase of the writings (speech) of a third person. A 12 year old can walk up to a porn mag and open it with no age verification.

the free open source alternatives aren't equivalent.

They're all crap.

I completely disagree, but, it's not like people won't use things that are crap (look at Windows).

MS Office and Google Docs fully solve this problem

So why does anyone pay for MS Office when Google Docs is free?

I looked it up before I asked, and everything I saw said that you CAN sideload on iOS. Can you provide a citation for it not being allowed?

Seems to me that Google's move may be in violation of competition laws (although it seems you can still do it after a 24 hour wait?), so they may end up having to walk that back. Either way, that doesn't answer my question of how currently - before this change is put into place - banning an app means your software will be banned from the "smartphone" ecosystem, and how it's different than software not being in the Microsoft Store or in a Linux distro's default repositories.

I think marketing is the difference though, not freeness. After all, many people pay for subscriptions to Adobe, Office (or whatever they're calling it now), etc. instead of using free open source alternatives.

This duopoly means that if they decide to ban an app together, your software will be banned from the "smartphone" ecosystem.

Genuine question - How is this the case when you can sideload? How is it any different than software not being in the Microsoft Store or in a Linux distro's default repositories?

Youtube Premium (that's what it's called now, has been for longer than it was called Youtube Red) costs $13.99 per month, which is considerably more than a one time fee of $5.99. Musi also allows background play (listening while the app isn't on the screen, i.e. when it's minimized or the screen is locked/off), which you would otherwise have to pay the $13.99 per month for. Musi doesn't advertise this feature (probably so Google doesn't come after them) but I've seem people call it "the youtube background play app", suggesting this is the main feature they use it for.

No mistakes visible to a layman with little coding skill in 500 "pages" of code doesn't exactly instill confidence in me, but maybe that's just me.

You can take your soul back, if you're alive they haven't taken it yet.

There's more public transit in the US than you think, that you don't notice when you drive. I travel all over the US without ever setting foot in a personal vehicle. Yes US public transit is more often sucky than not, and pedestrian infrastructure to get to/from the stops and stations is pisspoor or non-existent, but I do it anyway (and I enjoy it far more than I do driving). For me it's a choice, but keep in mind that there are many people in the US that can't drive - due to disability, inability to afford a car, or etc. - and still manage to get around.

I don't expect people to go from 0 trips without driving to two weeks without filling up. After driving everywhere for ~15 years it took me a few weeks (but less than a month) to build up the stamina to walk/bike anywhere, and since US public transit is often sucky you may be in for a walk/bike to get to the nearest stop or station (although, depending on where you live, it may be possible to drive to the nearest stop or station without filling up for 2 weeks). But people can start small - take a walk or a bike ride every day after work, starting with a very short one and then getting longer and longer. Take public transit on your day off, to do errands that aren't time-sensitive at first, or just to ride around getting used to it and looking at the area in a way you can't when you're focused on the road. If there's truly no public transit anywhere near your home, drive to the nearest place there is some. And yeah these things will take more time than just driving (maybe, depending on where you live and where you go - in cities driving is often actually the slowest way to get around)... but you'll be healthier and live longer. (And while on public transit you can do whatever you want - read, nap, watch something, whatever. And if other people are going with you, you can be mentally present with them instead of focusing on the road. And, you don't have the stress of having lives in your hands that you get while driving. So it isn't like driving but longer.)

You'll see more public transportation and trails and etc. exist than you imagined (and wonder how you could have missed then while driving, maybe start to think about what else you might be missing), but you'll also see where they're lacking, and why they suck. But then you can then advocate for change. Because there's people that can't drive, and because even those of us that can drive should have the choice to not drive for every trip. If we just throw up our hands and go "public transportation is dead, we have to drive" it will be self-fulfilling, because transit and pedestrian infrastructure will continue to get worse and reduced, and the time where we can turn our individual health/fitness level around and actually gain the ability to walk/bike will run out.

Actually come to think of it, if you schedule sleep so there's always at least an hour before it's time to get ready and leave, you don't even have to change your/your kids' actual sleep schedule, just go to bed/wake up with an hour difference on the clock.

In the other direction you reasonably can only wake up 15 min late on Friday,

Only if you assume you have to wake up close to when it's time to leave for work part of the year. You can do it in 10 or 5 minute increments in the other direction, if you *always* wake up at least an hour before you have to get ready and leave. It's just that part of the year you'd have at least 2 hours. If your kid consistently sleeps the same amount of hours, and you put the kid to bed 5 minutes later, they'll wake up 5 minutes later; but it probably won't work with a big chunk of time.

When I use to commute by driving, I would always wake up with enough time to "fully wake up", so that I wasn't driving while groggy. Another bonus was that I wasn't stressed out by the need to get ready/get my kids ready fast. And if traffic was bad I could leave a bit earlier. (Nowadays I can go back to sleep once I get on the train and my kids get themselves up and where they need to go...)